Binary Code Doubles As A Time Capsule For The Next Millennium

10/31/13

Written By:

Sara Boboltz

Printed volumes provide a history of modern-day life for future humans or other intelligent lifeforms.

An artist collective in the Netherlands wrote a book about modern culture so future generations might learn how people used ‘fax machines’ to send one another paper messages and rode around on self-powered ‘bikes.’ But in order to ensure their record lasts through the next millennium, La Société Anonyme wrote the whole thing in binary code.

No one can truly know how much of today’s data and records — although they might seem inescapable today — will be around in hundreds of years. The files included in the SKOR Codex, however, are protected from bitrot, software decay, and hardware failure by the simple way they’ve been preserved in printed form. Eight copies of the codex will be distributed to different locations around the world — the fifth having recently been gifted to Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who is credited with inventing the internet. Another copy lives at the National Library of France in Paris.

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